Boyfriend denies being jealous of slain child

The boyfriend of a young woman charged with killing her 2-year-old son denied on Tuesday of being jealous of the youngster who died from a broken back.

Sergio Martinez-Gonzalez took the stand and at first was talkative to the point of being loquacious, but later began giving increasingly shorter answers and saying that he did not recall events and conversations.

Adrianna Lucero, who was 17 when her son Alejandro was killed, is charged with the boy's slaying. She is on trial charged with first-degree felony murder and second-degree felony child abuse in the incident that occurred Aug. 24, 2008.

Martinez-Gonzalez, 28, said he had never been alone with the boy who was not his son, never fed or bathed him and "had no problem with him."

"I tried to keep my distance from him," he said.

Questioned about that by prosecutor Cristina Ortega, Martinez-Gonzalez referred to an earlier situation where he said he saw Lucero push the child very hard. Martinez-Gonzalez said when he questioned his girlfriend about why she did that, she replied that the boy was her son, so why would Martinez-Gonzalez care what happened.

The couple also had twin sons together who were five months old when Alejandro died. In addition, Martinez-Gonzales is married to a woman in Mexico and has two children with her.

He said Lucero would get "very upset" when he called the children in Mexico. When he mentioned bringing them to this country, he said, Lucero threatened to kill his wife and those two children. He said Lucero also repeatedly threatened to get him deported to Mexico.

Martinez-Gonzales testified that on the day Alejandro died, Martinez-Gonzalez played soccer, then brought Lucero, Alejandro and one of the twins (the other was in the hospital with an undisclosed health problem) to his Kearns home. The children awoke from naps, Martinez-Gonzalez put on a horror movie, and Lucero took the toddler to get some Jell-O from a refrigerator in another room.

When she came back with the child in her arms, Martinez-Gonzalez said, he could see something bad had happened. He testified that he tried first aid and wanted to take the child to a hospital, while Lucero wanted to call her mother. She did call 911 and the child was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.